Future Urban Planners at Work?

How do you make a positive change in your community? Just ask a group of ‘tweens.

A team of Pawcatuck Middle School students worked on a downtown Pawcatuck beautification project and a economic development plan for a Mechanic Street mill. Their ideas will restore your faith in our future!

Teachers Tina Eisenbeis and Marika Heughins have led the PFISH class, a multi-age looping program at Pawcatuck Middle School, for the past six years. The program focuses on project based learning and multiple intelligences. (This was the final project for the program as it will not be in place for the 2013-2014 school year.)

Here’s a summary of the projects completed by the PFISH kids at the middle school. Provided by  Eisenbeis and Heughins:

Students were challenged to come up with an idea of how they could make a positive change to our community of Pawcatuck.

Students brainstormed ideas and finally decided on four main topics. They were divided into groups based on interest. Once in the groups, the students assigned one another roles such as researcher, team leader, art department, and technology department. Then they went to work. The groups put together the persuasive presentations using Power Point as well as posters that were decorated with photos, drawings, charts and graphs from surveys they conducted, and flyers for the community. Students presented their ideas to Stonington First Selectman Edward Haberak in hopes that at least one of the ideas would come to fruition. Mr. Haberak provided positive feedback to the students as well as taking the time to ask the students to go a little deeper in their explanation. The greatest compliment came to the students when Mr. Haberek asked if the groups would be willing to present their ideas to local merchants.

The groups included:

Downtown Pawcatuck: Students presented ideas on ways to use the abandoned mill on Mechanic Street in Pawcatuck. Their ideas included: locally owned ice cream shops, boutiques, restaurants, book stores, and gift shops. They also presented ideas of how to use the outside property for bike and kayak rentals. Their goal was to promote tourism in Pawcatuck. Their motto was, "Less Gas, More Tourists, More Cash."

Pawcatuck Beautification: Students expressed their idea of beautifying the neighborhoods of Pawcatuck by showing before and after pictures of homes, sidewalks, and landscaping in a neighborhood. To make this happen, they proposed an annual Pawcatuck Beautification Day. This would be a friendly neighborhood competition to excite residents to "Clean-Up Pawcatuck" with a plaque for the winning neighborhood. The group made flyers and a list of rules for residents. Their motto was, "Battle to Beautify."

Parks: Students were divided into two groups. 

Group one proposed a local Pawcatuck park that would give residents of all ages a green space to play, walk, and enjoy nature. This park would give enjoyment to the community and bring families together as well as helping the economy of local businesses.

Group Two proposed an amusement park for families to enjoy quality time together. This group emphasized the need to local jobs as well as the highlighting the benefit to our local businesses due to the number of guests that would be exploring our town.